How To Tune Up Your Attitude

By Barbara Bartlein

The e-mail has been buzzing with responses to my recent article, Hire for Attitude, Train for Skill. Many provided commentary, but most asked the question, “So, tell me, how can I change an attitude?” While the intent may be to change someone else: a co-worker, teenager, or spouse (all impossible by the way), most people were asking about themselves. Many of us know when our attitude tanks but feel helpless to change. Here are some techniques that I have found helpful:

• Have a check up. Periodically ask your spouse, best friend, or co-workers what they think of your attitude. Others often see the signs of attitude toxicity long before we can see it ourselves. Encourage people you trust to give you honest feedback. Or just ask your kids…they will tell you quite bluntly.
  
  
• Garbage in, garbage out. As any technology nerd can tell you, if you load contaminated data into a computer, the resulting reports will be garbage. Your computer (brain) works the same way. Your thoughts, feelings, and beliefs will be based on the data you enter. Do you read, watch, and listen to the best that is out there? Or waste precious hours watching mindless TV and violent media. For clear productive thinking read fine literature, spend time listening to music, and challenge yourself to learn more.
  
  
• Find at least one moment per day to enjoy. If you enjoy something everyday, at the end of the week, you will have had an enjoyable week. At the end of the month, an enjoyable month. And, if you do it consistently, you will have an enjoyable life. Yes…it IS that simple. Practice each day finding things to enjoy and laugh about. It is the enjoyment of everyday events that make a life, not the one or two big events that some of us are lucky enough to have.
  
  
• Avoid the “if only” game. You lottery players know this game. “If only” I would win the lottery. “If only” I got the promotion, the diploma, the good looking guy. The “if only” game leaves us always living in the future, believing that happiness is just around the next corner, the next big break. If you wait for the magical day to appear, you will miss the present. There is no special event that will make your life perfect – you have to do it.
  
  
• Sleep on it. Pay special attention to what you do in the evening before going to bed. This is actually a great time for learning and attitude rejuvenation. A recent study in the July 3rd issue of Neuron, showed that people who trained on a new skill or task and then slept a good night’s sleep were 20% more effective than those who trained in the morning and tested later. Positive brain action tends to continue while we sleep. Evening is a good time for reading motivational and positive thinking books and information.
  
  
• Let gratitude be your attitude. Remember to spend as much time looking at what is going right as what goes wrong. Too often we take for granted the good things in life, like health, family, and friends. Take stock of your blessings and remember to be thankful. Make tuning up your attitude a priority. Remember, if you growl all day, you will feel dog-tired all night.
  

Sign up for Barbara's FREE email newsletter at www.barbbartlein.com.

Barbara Bartlein is the PeoplePro™. She helps businesses sell more goods and services by developing people. She can be reached at 888-747-9953, by email at: barb@barbbartlein.com or visit her Web site at www.ThePeoplePro.com.

Published in Networking Today, August 2002.